Kameron's POV ....
I went through six glasses of bourbon and still felt on edge. I did everything in my power to keep my mind off of Callie but, no matter what I did, my mind always wandered back to those captivating sapphire eyes. I never saw eyes quite like hers before.
Everything about Callie called me. She didn't even need to speak-all she had to do was just exist. I never in my life experienced something so strong. I had only known the girl less than 72 hours and yet she had my head in a tailspin. She was haunting me like a ghost.
I looked to the health center again, willing myself not to follow my instincts, and run to the building. Jorge was probably in there interrogating her as I asked. I wondered what she had told him. If he even managed to get her to talk. She was so guarded and closed off.
I knew from the moment I looked into her eyes that she had seen a lot in this world. Things that only a few ever witnessed in their entire lives. It made me want to protect her and hurt whoever had caused those scars on her body.
"What the hell is wrong with me?" I reprimanded myself. I shouldn't want to protect her. I shouldn't want to be near her. She was making me lose my mind. I was a man of law and order. Callie was chaos, confusion, and uncertainty. She was a risk to my leadership and thereby risk to my pack.
I was set to marry Florence within a few months ... She was the daughter of an alpha and, if the rumors were true, quite the sight to behold. This not only secured more pack lands for me, but it gave me a greater foothold against other alphas. She was everything I should have wanted in a mate, fated or not.
Yet, she was not what my heart desired. Callie was nothing. She came with no land, no status, and no pack to inherit. She was worse than the lowest ranking omega in my pack because she was a rogue.
Yet, my wolf was still so drawn to her. Her scent. called to me and her eyes trapped me.
Usually, my wolf and I were always on the same page when it came to our emotions and decisions, but here we were at odds. He wanted to go one way, while I wanted to go another. He was running on pure emotion and feeling and I couldn't afford to think like that. I had the pack to think about. Callie didn't matter in our decision-making-but he didn't get that.
She is your mate. You can deny the pull all you want, but you are only delaying the inevitable.
My internal voice was trying to tell me a truth I wanted to ignore.
She couldn't be my mate. I was 25; my window to find my mate had long passed and I was engaged to mate to another.
Callie was no one to me.
I felt that if I repeated the lie to myself enough times, I would soon begin to believe it. I had to believe it-otherwise, all my plans for this pack's future would turn to ash.
"Screw this." I walked away from my window and headed downstairs.
It was the early hours of the morning and everyone was fast asleep within the packhouse. I walked quietly through the halls, making sure not to wake anyone up. I had a home of my own within the compound, but I preferred to stay with my pack. It made it easier for them to reach me when they needed me.
I needed to let my wolf out. The fresh air would do him some good and would calm my racing mind.
"Alpha," a few guards on patrol around the packhouse greeted me. I nodded to them but didn't stop till I was clear of the house and behind the tree line.
I jumped into the air and shifted into my raven-black wolf. I shifted often, and the transition from man to wolf was almost as natural as breathing. I hardly felt my bones crack anymore, which was not an easy feat for many wolves to achieve, even alphas.
When my paws hit the ground, I took off into a sprint. I pushed my legs as fast as they could carry me. I weaved through the trees with great ease. The moon cast a blue hue across the forest, lighting the darkness.
I was weaving through the trees when I picked up on a scent that I had grown all too familiar with now. Callie.
I knew she was in the healing center, and there was no way she got out-I had the building surrounded and Rex would have told me. There was another reason why her scent was in this forest, and I was going to find out why.
I took a sharp right and followed her intoxicating scent. Images of her fiery red hair and sapphire eyes filled my mind as the scent got stronger. I was pushing my legs even harder, my wolf trying to take control, but I knew better than to let him take the reins. He wasn't stable. When it came to Callie, he had shown that he abandoned all logic, and neither of us could afford that.
The closer I drew to the source of the scent, the further I drew from familiar territory. I came to a halt just by the edge of my pack lines, where I lifted my nose to make sure I still had the right scent. Yep, that was still her.
I looked around and a few seconds later, I found what I was looking for. Splattered on the floor were spots of Callie's blood. This was where Thomas told me that they found her.
Her scent was a mixture of vanilla and rose petals. It was, hands-down, the best scent I had ever smelled in my entire life.
Only after closer observation did I notice that her scent actually wasn't strongest on my lines, but rather on the territory lines of the Red Maple Pack. The same pack that belonged to the woman I was supposed to be marrying in a few months.
Callie had come through their lands? Bryon was not going to be pleased. He was a pompous man who took pride in his patrol wolves. He once boasted that he had the most impenetrable territory of all the packs in the surrounding area. If he found out that his lines had been breached, and by a lone wolf no less, his anger would be unleashed on everyone around him-including Callie. I wouldn't risk it. Not with Callie. So this was one secret I was more than happy to keep from him.
I looked out into the distance. Thomas said that she came in from the east. A small group of wolves had been chasing her, but they didn't know how long she had been running.
The only thing that lay to the east was a lot of no-man's-land. The majority of the land was an unclaimed territory, areas that rogues were allowed to roam freely. It made sense why she had come in from there.
I hated to think of Callie as a rogue, but that was exactly what she was. In our world, a rogue was not perceived in a good way. They have often exiled pack members who failed to follow the rules or went against the alpha. Many of them were traitors, murderers, and thieves-but I couldn't imagine Callie being any of those things.
The majority of rogues were killed on sight if they stepped into a pack's territory. It was the law that any rogue found crossing into pack lines was at minimum to be returned to their alpha to stand trial.
A part of me worried that Callie revealed what pack she was from to Jorge, and I feared my decision was going to be forced. I didn't want to turn Callie in.
'You cannot continue to deny what you already know to be true,' my internal voice reprimanded me.
My wolf had been trying to tell me the same thing, but I was the one who wasn't listening. I knew I couldn't deny the truth any longer. Callie was my mate and nothing was going to change that but I couldn't allow myself to accept her. I already made a prior commitment to Florence. If I was to break this treaty it could mean war for my pack.
Although my wolf didn't like it, I made my decision. I had to find a way to push my feelings down for Callie. I needed to find a way to forget about the pull and her.
I was about to turn around to head back to the pack compound when something caught my eye in the distance. I noticed four black wolves teetering on the borders of the Red Maple Pack. At first, II thought they were a part of Byron's patrol detail, but my wolf sensed otherwise.
These wolves were outsiders and didn't seem friendly.
As an alpha, my wolf easily towered over theirs. They were watching me-or, more so, my borderlines. They hadn't crossed over, so I couldn't run them off. I waited to see what they would do, but they didn't move. They just stood in the tree-line of the Red Maple Pack borderline, waiting.
"What were they waiting for?' I thought to myself. Were they waiting for Callie? Were these the wolves that chased her down when she crossed over into my packs?
I lifted my head and sent a warning growl. I started each one of them down, making sure they understood my threat. They waited a few more minutes before they slunk into the shadows of the trees and took off running.
I had a feeling that they wouldn't be gone for long, and they would be back.
'Byron, you idiot,' I reprimanded my future father-in-law in my mind. Not only had Callie crossed over his lines, but these wolves were wandering around right on his borders and his men did nothing. If this was the pack I was to inherit, then a lot of things were in need of change.
I huffed and took off running back to the compound. The sun was peeking through the horizons of the mountains. I had been awake all through the night. My mind was plagued with the images of my mate and my conflicting emotions. I was battling with my head and my heart.
Not once in my life had I been so conflicted. I wanted Callie, but I knew I couldn't have her.